In order to operate on a given tissue or a blood vessel, surgeons must ligate or occlude nearby blood vessels to prevent patient blood loss.
Since laparoscopic and endoscopic surgical procedures are conducted through a small incision in the skin or natural body orifices, the surgeon must have long and narrow tools to complete this ligation or occlusion of blood vessels. These tools must be small enough to be inserted through an incision and long enough to reach the desired blood vessels within the patient.
Surgeons employ small surgical clips and long clip appliers to ligate or occlude blood vessels in laparoscopic and endoscopic surgical procedures. These surgical clips need to perform multiple functions.
First, the surgical clip must be securely fastened to the blood vessel. Movement or slippage of the surgical clip on the vessel should be minimized or eliminated once the clip has been applied. Second, the surgical clip should completely close the blood vessel to which it is applied. Movement or slippage of the surgical clip or failure to fully close a blood vessel may cause one or more of the following: damage to nearby tissue, interference on the surgical site, patient blood loss, a lethal drop in blood pressure, or loss of the clip inside the patient.
Third, the surgical clip should be designed to minimize damage to the closed blood vessel and surrounding tissue as much as possible. Surgical clips that cause tissue or blood vessel damage may result in internal bleeding, a lethal drop in blood pressure, infections, or longer recovery periods.
Examples of surgical clips are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,610,073; 6,217,590; 5,509,920; 5,501,693; 5,201,746; 5,171,253; 5,171,252; 5,100,420; 5,084,057; 5,026,382; 4,971,198; 4,976,722; 4,979,950; 4,844,066; 4,799,481; 4,702,247; 4,414,721; 4,188,953; 4,146,130; 3,867,944; and 3,363,628; and U.S. Published Patent Application Nos. 2007/0173866; 2005/0273122; and 2004/0153107; all of which are herein incorporated by reference in their entirety.
These previously disclosed surgical clips do not adequately securely fasten to and completely close a blood vessel while minimizing surrounding tissue damage. Another problem for these previously disclosed surgical clips is the phenomenon known as the “scissoring” effect
Previously disclosed surgical clips are either U-shaped or V-shaped. These shapes are defined by a pair of legs joined at a proximate end by an apex and spaced apart at a distal end to define a space between the legs. A clip applier places a surgical clip over a blood vessel within this space and compresses the legs to ligate the vessel.
Scissoring occurs when, due to deformation of the surgical clips in the clip applier, the legs do not align and are offset at the distal ends with respect to each other. This misalignment causes the surgical clip to cut or sever blood vessels during application. Scissoring can also prevent the clip from completely closing the vessel.
Accordingly, the subject invention is a novel surgical clip that securely fastens to and completely closes a blood vessel while minimizing surrounding tissue damage. In addition, this novel surgical clip prevents vessel damage due to the “scissoring” effect.